E-commerce big Jumia is now providing its logistics community to third-party companies, together with merchants who function solely on social media platforms, a section it beforehand thought of competitors. The strategic pivot, geared toward lowering fulfilment prices and diversifying income, comes as the corporate doubles down on attaining profitability by 2027.
The brand new service, Jumia Supply, permits third-party sellers to ship packages nationwide by means of Jumia’s present logistics infrastructure, together with its 494 pickup stations in Nigeria. After a pilot in Ivory Coast, the service launched in Nigeria and can quickly develop to Kenya, Senegal, and Ghana, pending regulatory approvals.
“Native social commerce retailers [one of our competitors] will at all times be round, and we’re this pool of retailers as a chance for Jumia,” CEO Francis Dufay shared on its Q1 earnings name on Could 8. “We’re working to onboard them to our market and assist them generate extra gross sales. We’re additionally seeking to promote our Jumia supply providers and generate earnings from them.”
The transfer places Jumia in competitors with established logistics suppliers like Uber, Bolt, Chowdeck, Sendbox, and GIG, which have already constructed vital distribution networks. In contrast to its opponents, Jumia is betting that opening up its achievement engine will drive scale and enhance price effectivity throughout its operations, notably within the final mile.
Till now, Jumia has applied a number of methods to cut back supply bills, which amounted to $9.4 million within the first quarter of 2025, and improve margins. To date, the advantages have come from employees reductions, together with a 3% lower in headcount in Q1 2025, renegotiated agreements for logistics and know-how, and extra environment friendly warehouse processes. Jumia Supply will enable the corporate to maneuver extra items in every journey, optimising mounted prices reminiscent of warehousing and last-mile operations.
Nonetheless, Jumia Supply should contend towards just a few gamers which have gained floor in distributing their logistics providers and earned model fairness, together with established gamers like DHL, GIG Logistics, Kwik Supply, and Sendbox. Jumia additionally faces competitors from the supply providers of Glovo, Chowdeck, Uber, Indrive, and Bolt, that are leveraging community results to distribute their supply providers. The corporate can even compete with a rising variety of unbiased supply riders, who leverage private relationships and supply extra aggressive pricing to sellers.
Nonetheless, Jumia’s management is optimistic. “It is a scalable enterprise that extends our price proposition throughout the digital financial system,” the corporate said. This improvement and different beneficial properties shared through the report have been effectively acquired by traders: Jumia’s share worth climbed from $2.40 to $3.55 after its earnings name.